We need to push back against the alcohol industry's attempt to getthe Governor to veto HB155 which lowers the BAC in Utah to 0.05%. Lowering the BAC limit to 0.05% is not about drinking; it is about separating drinking from driving. It is about preventing crashes, injuries, and deaths.

This bill doesn’t take away anyone’s current legal right to drink. This bill does prevent someone from legally drivingwhile impaired.

"This is critical because impaired driving remains one of the biggest killers in the United States," said Deborah Hersman, the NTSB chairman. "To make a bold difference will require bold action. But it can be done."Please take a moment and call the Governor - 801-538-1000.

Monday morning at 8 am, HB 136, “Board of Education Revisions”, will be heard in the Senate education committee. This is the bill that lets the state school board reject federal mandates, and if the feds decide to pull some funding (less risk now that we have a more local control friendly administration), it allows the board to ask the governor and legislature to find a way to mitigate the risk. Only 2-2.5% of our state’s education budget is at risk and there is no guarantee the feds would pull any funding at all. It’s never happened.Here’s the bill, and the language the bill creates is very short on lines 60-72.http://le.utah.gov/~2017/bills/static/HB0136.htmlIt passed the House on a 59-14 vote, but this Senate Education committee is a different story and where we might think it would be a shoe-in, it isn’t.Please take the following action today.

Email the committee members asking them to vote YES on HB 136. Put something like that in your subject line so if they don’t read the email they see your desired action.

Write your email as short and polite as possible. This helps ensure it gets read or at least scanned quickly.

It would be best to send individual emails instead of in bulk to the entire committee,

If you can call or text your Senator because they are your senator, that would be fantastic.

Because of you and all of your hard work HJR 3, a resolution to include Utah in the call for an Article V Convention, was defeated on Thursday, February 23. The Senate voted 16 to 12 against HJR 3. Senator Lyle Hillyard was called off the floor for a few minutes and while he was gone the Senate called for a vote on the bill. Before he left, Senate Hillyard, spoke against the bill and said he was a no vote, so actually, opposing the bill were 17 senators.

Below is a list of the Senators who voted NO on HJR 3. If your Senator is on this list be sure and thank them for their no vote.

In 2001 Senator Bill Wright was the sponsor of Utah’s current health education law that emphasizing abstinence before marriage and fidelity after marriage. Representative Brian King is the sponsor of HB 215, Reproductive Health Education, that would completely change Utah’s very successful abstinence based sex education law to comprehensive sex education.

Representative King’s comprehensive sex education bill will be in the House Education Committee on Monday, February 6 at 3:40 PM in room 30 House building.

Utah’s current law teaches:[ abstinence192 before marriage and fidelity after marriage, and prohibiting instruction in:];193 [(I) the intricacies of intercourse, sexual stimulation, or erotic behavior;]194 [(II) the advocacy of homosexuality;]195 [(III) the advocacy or encouragement of the use of contraceptive methods or devices;196 or]197 [(IV) the advocacy of sexual activity outside of marriage;]As you can see, the proposed comprehensive sex education bill strikes all of that very important language that teaches abstinence and replaces it with very suggestive language that they claim will improvebehavior, including:(A) sexual abstinence and delaying sexual initiation;(B) reducing the frequency of sexual intercourse;(C) reducing the number of sexual partners; and(D) increasing the use of condoms and other contraceptives;(ii) "Human health" includes information about the correct and consistent use of sexual abstinence, contraception, condoms, and other birth control barrier methods.​After they mention abstinence they teach the children that they should delay sexual initiation or just reduce how often they have sex or reduce the number of partners. Of course, after teaching them it is okay to have sex they teach them to increase their use of condom and other contraceptives.

Many of our conservative legislators who are normally with us on the issues that are important to us, are voting for and supporting a resolution for a Constitutional Convention HJR-3! This horrible resolution is designed to rewrite our divinely inspired constitution. Unless the legislators receive hundreds of calls, texts, and emails this weekend most of the Republicans in the House will vote for and pass a resolution to require Congress to call a convention to amend the Constitution multiple times.

This has never been done before, amendments have always been done one at a time over 229 year history. The Article V Convention proposed in this resolution would allow as many amendments to pass in one convention that have passed in the last 222 years since the ratification of the 11th amendment to the United States Constitution."

This is the Convention of States proposal, an unlimited convention opening every section of the Constitution to structural change and possibly a revolutionary rewrite. Do you trust your state politicians and the politicians from States like California to monkey with our U.S. Constitution?

Please call, text and email your legislators this weekend and ask them to vote against HJR-3 Joint Resolution Calling for a Convention to Amend the Constitution of the United States by Representitive Merrill Nelson. See bill text here:http://le.utah.gov/~2017/bills/static/HJR003.html!

Convention of States Reveals their Revolutionary Agenda:An Unlimited Convention to Structurally Change the U.S. ConstitutionBy Janine Hansen, Constitutional Issues Chairman Eagle ForumIn an article on World Net Daily dated March 3, 2014 the revolutionary agenda of the Convention of States organization was unmasked. http://www.wnd.com/2014/03/new-push-for-limits-on-washington-power/

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION 8

ARE THERE OTHER RAMIFICATIONSWE HAVE NOT BEEN MADE AWARE OF?

Utah passed a resolution in the last session calling for a Balanced Budget. Is the current proposed call for an Article 5 Convention not redundant and a gross waste of time?

HJR 8 calls for imposing “fiscal restraints” on Congress. Congress has for many years sponsored and paid for a host of programs that are not authorized by the U.S. Constitution. By what stretch of any imagination will Congress comply with a new set of “restraints?”

The only way Congress can comply with the demand to balance the budget is to spend less by reducing expenditures or to finance their spending desires by borrowing money, creating it out of “thin air” (by way of The Federal Reserve, which it has been doing for years), or by increasing taxes. It seems obvious that spending more (not less) will win the day. Even Senator Neiderhauser has said that Utah would not agree to take less from the Federal Government. Which states would take less?

The U.S. Constitution is a set of prohibitions on Congress which have consistently been ignored for many years. It is illogical to assume that Congress will adhere to a new set of prohibitions. They will not.

Some want to “limit the terms of office” and seek to accomplish this by an amendment to the Constitution. Limiting the terms in office obviously depends on who you want there. Those you do not like you want out. Those you do like, you want in.

The best tool for limiting terms in office is an informed electorate. Those who do the “hiring” should do the “firing,” but this cannot be done unless you are watching what your “employee” is doing. We are getting what we deserve through our inattention.

It would seem that some who want to limit terms could set an example by resigning their own offices after a certain number of years in the Utah Legislature. They can and should show us how it ought to be done.

The states may very well call for a Convention, but Congress will set the terms, chose how the delegates would be selected and set the ground rules. The States would say, “Yes sir.” And how many delegates would Utah have. 6? And how many would California, New York, Texas, and some other heavily populated states have?

And finally, just as in the 1787 Convention where the delegates came with very specific instructions about what they were allowed to do and how many of the Thirteen Colonies had to approve anything, the delegates did what they wanted. They redid the entire document and changed the number of states required to ratify it. The rules would change.

It is a fairy tale that an Article V Convention could be controlled. We have forgotten that a Convention is a gathering of the sovereign. The people are sovereign and when they meet they will do what they want to do. Or, to be more precise, they will do what they are encouraged and pressured to do as they react to lengthy, ongoing, intense, and even threatening pressure from a large variety of sources who will be watching every move and every word.

Who would risk what we have for the unknown? There are some, apparently, but they ought to be ignored. Let us in Utah be wise and protect this invaluable document!

“These are the times that try men’s souls,” so wrote Thomas Paine in “Common Sense” during the Revolutionary War. He also wrote about “The Summer Soldier” and the “Sunshine Patriot.”

When we think about those days (if we do) and the participants - who do we remember? Do we remember those with Washington at Valley Forge, the army at Albany or those at Bunker Hill? Do we remember those who wanted to be obedient and subservient to the king? Do we remember those who were too busy, did not want to be separated from their families, did not have, or were unwilling to make the time, did not want to take any risks, did not want to contribute any money, and most certainly did not want to get into a military fight with the world’s strongest and most experienced army and navy. They did not want to risk anything and wanted to be well thought of by their uninvolved “friends” and most certainly did not want to risk being killed. Living in tents, marching, poor food, bad weather, associating with people who are sometimes rude and obnoxious, and a host of other very inconvenient conditions was not something most were willing to do. We can understand that.

So who do we remember from those days? The great majority who did nothing or quit before it was over? Or do we remember those who stuck it out making great sacrifices, even giving their lives, and gave us the freedom we enjoy today.

Brigham Young, our territorial governor prior to statehood, talked about people wanting to pick apples off of trees they did not plant. Is this not what so many are doing today. We enjoy the fruits of freedom purchased with the blood and lives of those early Americans. Will we not then nourish the tree, till the soil, prune the branches, water, and fertilize this remarkable blessing and gift of freedom?

“These are the times that try men’s souls,” so wrote Thomas Paine in “Common Sense” during the Revolutionary War. He also wrote about “The Summer Soldier” and the “Sunshine Patriot.”

When we think about those days (if we do) and the participants - who do we remember? Do we think about those with Washington at Valley Forge, the army at Albany or those at Bunker Hill? Do we ever think about or remember those who wanted to be obedient and subservient to the king? Do we think about those who were too busy, did not want to be separated from their families, did not have, or were unwilling to make the time, did not want to take any risks, did not want to contribute any money, and most certainly did not want to get into a military fight with the world’s strongest and most experienced army and navy. They did not want to risk anything and wanted to be well thought of by their uninvolved “friends” and most certainly did not want to risk being killed. Living in tents, marching, poor food, bad weather, associating with people who are sometimes rude and obnoxious, and a host of other very inconvenient conditions was not something most were willing to do. We can understand that.

So who do we remember about those days? The great majority who did nothing or quit before it was over. Or do we remember those who stuck it out making great sacrifices, even giving their lives, and gave us the freedom we enjoy today.

Brigham Young talked about people wanting to pick apples off of trees they did not plant. Is this not what so many are doing today. We enjoy the fruits of freedom purchased with the blood and lives of those early Americans. Will we not then nourish the tree, till the soil, prune the branches, water, and fertilize this remarkable blessing and gift of freedom?

These days are truly trying. They are difficult . . time consuming . . stressful. They cause challenges with family, friends, neighbors, business associates, and fellow church-goers.

Fully 95% of the people I have associated with over the last 51 years are unwilling to be involved. They are content as long as the refrigerator is full of food and life is full of entertaining distractions. So, in these trying times, are they waiting for God to give them a personal invitation to do something meaningful?

If they went home tonight and found their home on fire what would they do? They would frantically work to put out the fire! I don't think anyone would wait for a commandment from God, because the necessity would be so apparent, there would be no need. Immediate necessity is the mother of effort.

So, how do I want to be remembered? As someone who was like a Roman Candle, burned hot and bright for a few months and then went back to sleep. In the end, I want to be remembered not as a mere observer and a rider in the boat, but as someone who pulled on the oars! I want to be remembered, not as a person who stood on the sidelines while the fire raged, but as a part of the bucket brigade! I want to be remembered as a doer, not a whiner!

Come join me at the oars!Dave Jorgensen

​PS. Utah Eagle Forum is there, fighting the fires and pulling on the oars.Check them out at: